


the stranger crusaders

by thescyfychannel



Series: Intricacy AU [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sgrub Session, Blood, Blood and Injury, Canon-Typical Violence, F/M, M/M, Multi, Sparring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-13
Updated: 2018-08-13
Packaged: 2019-06-26 23:34:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15673536
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thescyfychannel/pseuds/thescyfychannel
Summary: high hopes make for slim pickings, but seadwellers are supposed to be better than thatyou have—both of you have—been assured of this knowledge all your lifeof course, both of you have been assured of steady futures and long livesit turns out seadwellers aren't better than that at all.





	the stranger crusaders

Her trident whistles through the air and nearly clips you on the side of the head. Yours snaps up neatly and catches it: the resulting clang has her wincing, fins folding back in pain.

Eridan, of course, takes advantage.

With her sensory organs folded up like that, she doesn't catch his currents in the air until it's a moment too late, his own wild charge catching her off guard. She barely darts out of the way of his trident's sweep, and has to abandon hers in a graceful leaping move that puts her over both of your heads. Not bad.

Or it wouldn't have been, if it hadn't unarmed her so neatly for the both of you.

When you come at her again, three ends honed to the finest point, she has nothing to block with but her hands—

You regret, for a moment, forgetting about her willingness to do just that.

 

* * *

 

Neither you nor Dan like the sight of Tyrian blood flowing so freely and heavily, and Feferi Peixes, in all her grace and glory, knows it, that smug little shit. It's a half hour gone since that round, and she's already bandaged up, sitting tight between the two of you, a whiteboard on the ground before you three, as Dan outlines all the shit she did wrong. Her pleasure at getting one over on you is slowly, slowly turning to temper, as you chime in every so often and help to twist the knife deeper. The Condesce won't be nearly so squeamish at the sight of her cut skin, and if she won't take her lessons on court, you'll make sure she takes them off it.

"I  _get_ it," she nearly snarls at you, her fins snapping like she's liable to snap herself, any moment. Tyrians ride a razor's edge, you know it as well as the rest of your line.

That doesn't stop you from giving her a mocking little smile, and jerking your chin towards the paper. "If you knew it," you say, your eyes on hers, "you'd have done it right."

She lunges at you. Eridan does not intervene.

The lesson moves back to the sparring courts.

 

* * *

 

Your report goes to your Ancestor, and the two of you are barred from the sparring block for the next night's lesson. You cool your heels in the hallway as you listen to your girl cry out whenever your Ancestor catches her wrongways. You both know—can easily imagine—the kind of fight going on in there. You've both been in there yourselves, a time or two: Mercy is something your Ancestor believes is better earned, rarely freely given.

You both snap to attention when he strides out of there after a full hour, longer than either of you have ever lasted, and you see the burning flash of jealousy in your own heart—that she could hold out so long, that she could hold so much of his attention for so long—echoed in Eridan's eyes. "Not bad," the Orphaner Dualscar tells the both of you, and your spines straighten even more. Praise is an easy balm for the anguished soul, especially when it's as uncommon as his.

 

When you go in there, pitch-fueling jealousy is completely doused in something a sight more pale. For all that she is an unbreakable tyrian, Feferi Peixes does not look it, curled up on the ground and shaking. Smears of pink scatter the floor around her, traces, broad stripes where she dragged herself further away from a deep puddle. This is not unfamiliar either.

The way she flinches away from both of you is.

Her injuries heal slower than usual, and the three of you sit there, silent, until she's finally well enough to haul herself back up to her feet and limp to her own block.

 

You both assume you'll have to chase her out of her block, the next night, the same way you've chased each other out countless times before. When you arrive there, though, Eridan's got a panicked look in his eyes— _she's not here_ , he says, dipping back into violet, into finspeak. If you can't find her—if she's run—if the unthinkable has happened—

Before you can second guess your own instincts, you grab him by the wrist and haul ass to the sparring blocks.

She's in your usual training court, her wrists wrapped, as she squares off with one of the training dummies. Judging by the sweat on her skin, and the heap of destroyed machinery—she won't be punished for that, seadwellers routinely chew through training equipment like it's a wriggler's first straw dummy—she's been here a while.

When your hand lands on her shoulder, she turns around, baring her fangs a second too slow. You hold steady. She nearly collapses into your arms.

Eridan scoops her up before you properly can, and the two of you turn around and head right back to her ransacked block.

Later, when you check the training logs, you learn that she's been there since the middle of the day. Neither of you report this to Dualscar. Both of you stay in her room through the rest of the night, and all of the day.

It's a start.

 

(Later, she'll wonder out loud if it was  _the_  start. You and Eridan exchange a look, and don't contradict her for another few sweeps.) 

 

* * *

 

Eventually, your Ancestor deems her ready to start sparring against others. She'd already been decent, you know it well, but the two of you—sometimes three—have trained away any possibility of being an embarrassment. Now, he's decided, it remains to be seen if she  _can_  be a credit.

You and Eridan don't need to see anything more. You already know she is.

 

After the first three trolls drop, he sends the next five in all at once.

Ten minutes later, she's the only one left standing, barely a scratch on her, and you think you see a flash of something in your Ancestor. It's nearly a smile. It might be pride.

This time, you don't need jealousy to stoke you more pitchwise—not when you're proud enough of her for all three of your line, and hers besides.

 

* * *

 

The three of you, you, Fef, Dan, go off and celebrate, and when you pass her block on the way back, barely even stumbling, she keeps walking. There's a pause, a hesitation at the block you and Dan share—and then Eridan yanks her into the room, and you barely remember to lock the door before he's got her pinned up against you.

You're not likely to protest, especially not when she turns to you, all that bare canvas so fucking inviting, and says your name like it belongs on her pretty little lips.

 

You wake, in the evening, with her curled up between the two of you. She's tucked up to Eridan's chest, and she's trusted her back to you. It makes something in your pusher ache, and you roll onto your side to curl around her, fling an arm across her and Dan both. He smirks at you—you didn't know he was up—before he goes back to stroking her hair, with a murmured order to pull up the covers you'd kicked off. You scowl, she shivers in her sleep, you rush to obey.

Damn. You're too far gone.

 

* * *

 

It is easier and harder to train her, the more you come to know her. 

Easier: You know what she is capable of. You know what she can do better than any troll alive, save Dan, save your Ancestor. She does not hold back from you, she does not hold back  _for_  you.

Harder: Increasingly, you have nightmares of seeing her break. Before you, under your own hands, or by the glory and grace of another's, another far closer to her than you could ever dream.

 

She does not seem to notice this change in you. She sees others, to be sure, but this one falls by the wayside in the wake of those.

Or so you assume.

 

This time, when you find her in your room, she's alone. Eridan is not with you, for once, separated by the changing schedules and shifts necessary to run a highblood's life.

She's alone, and she's waiting for you, and your heart runs over pitch.

 

* * *

 

(The start was when the two of you first laid eyes on her.)

**Author's Note:**

> there might be another chapter or two of this? who knows
> 
> felt like writing one of my own pswap prompts


End file.
